Year End Round Up

Happy Holidays from All of Us at The Felting and Fiber Studio

December 24, 2017 ruthlane Comments 19 comments

Here’s wishing all of you, (no matter what part of the world, or what holiday you prefer to celebrate), a wonderful holiday season. I find it hard to believe that we are already through 2017 and on to 2018. Time really seems to speed up at the end of the year for me.

Earlier this month, I showed you the beginnings of these three cards. I picked the card on the left to send to Tracey for our forum holiday card exchange. It’s been machine stitched and then I painted the berries. I did the same with the center card and I painted those berries too but somehow forgot to take a photo before I sent it off to my mom. And the last one is hand stitched. I actually liked how they all turned out and Tracey was very kind in her comments about the one which she received.

This is the card that I received from Tracey. Isn’t it beautiful? It looks like my neck of the woods and we probably have at least that much snow or more. The cabin looks so warm and cozy all lit up for the holidays. Thanks Tracey, I love it!

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I have had a busy year in 2017. I thought I would show you a slideshow of some of the pieces I have created. I am also taking Level 3 Art and Design at the Gail Harker Creative Studies Center. I don’t post very much about that here but if you’d like to see what I do for that class, you can follow my personal blog here. I am halfway through the class and having a wonderful time with that.

It’s cold and snowy here, the temperature was three degrees F when hubby took Symphony for a walk. She started out on the leash, here she is when she got back!

Thanks for visiting us throughout the year, we appreciate all of our followers and would love to hear from more of you. Please leave us a comment if you have the time. Or if you have an idea of what we should post about, we’d love to hear your thoughts. All the best from The Felting and Fiber Studio!

Pandagirl’s Year in Review 2016

December 29, 2016 Marilyn aka Pandagirl Comments 17 comments

I hope everyone had a nice holiday and are ready for the New Year.

It’s almost the end of 2016 and looking back on the things I’ve done, there seems to be a few themes.

I did a lot of natural dyeing. Avocado skins, pits and the combo.

Cochineal

Alkanet/Logwood

Osage

Madder

Cutch, Rhubarb and Indigo

Eco printing

Resists

Under the sea theme

2nd Quarter challenge working with scraps – the former credit card case turned into an ear bud case.

Then the cityscape with scraps.

A scarflette with locks

Ginkgo stitching

Crochet piece felted and embellished with stitching

Felting wit my grandsons

Silk scraps into a free motion stitched vase

3rd Quarter challenge adding dimension from Kristy Kun’s class

Ruth’s Paper Lamination class

Teri’s hat class

Mini weaving wall hanging

More work with scraps for a sewing machine case

4th Quarter Challenge with embellishments for a coupon case.

And blue booties for a shower

Of course, there were also plenty of samples during the year including using the needle felting machine to felt some unfeltable fabrics.

A big thank you to Cathy Wycliff for her post on weaving and felting; my sister Carol Olson for sharing her new sheep with us; Nada for sharing her workshop experience in Slovenia; Zara for her posts on Felting on a Trampoline and her Yak, Mongolian, Churro and Zwartables samples; Leonor for her soap tutorial and Terri Simon on sharing her projects from Kristy Kun’s class.

It was a great year for me in terms of learning new things and doing some recycling. How was your 2016 year of fibers?

Happy New Year and Happy Felting in 2017!

2016 Year End Round Up

December 27, 2016 zedster66 Comments 10 comments

Whenever I do a Year End Round Up, and look back over my posts, I always think ‘Was that really this year?’ I thought the same this time then realised I was looking at 2015! I seemed to have lots of stuff going on outside of felting and creating this year, so unlike Ruth, blogging frequently hasn’t really been able to keep me making things. But having to think of something to blog about has had me trying to be more observant, and think about other things fibre related to post about rather than finished items like I usually would. And looking back at the things I did make, it seems that experimenting, sampling and making ‘scruffy’ pieces of felt have been my ‘theme’ this year. I liked Ruth’s idea of a slideshow, so here’s some of my favourite photos of 2016:

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Year End Round Up 2016

December 23, 2016 ruthlane Comments 11 comments

Each year as the days get shorter, the temperature gets lower and it starts snowing, I get this feeling of disbelief. Where did the time go? Doesn’t it seem that we just started a new year? Now it’s almost 2017. Hard to believe.

One of the reasons that I like blogging on a regular basis is that it keeps me making things because blogging is boring without photos and it also keeps a record of what I have created. Whenever I look back over a year’s time, I realize that I got more done than I thought I had. I completed all the studio challenges this year, I taught 3 online courses and continued to write more, I tried a bunch more new techniques with my surface design group, held an ecoprint retreat, worked on administration tasks for outside teachers to teach on our online class site (thanks Teri and Galina), hung an ecoprint show with my local group, carded batts for a class I ended up not teaching and still found time to run my shop/gallery, volunteer for several non-profit organizations, ski, hike and enjoy life. I am so grateful for the abundance of creativity and joy in my life.

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I thought you might like to see a little slide show of some of what I did this year. I hope that you all have a wonderful holiday season and best wishes for the new year!

Don’t forget to sign up for an online class in 2017:

Experimental Screen Printing on Felt

Felting Fantasy Fish

Felted Concertina Hat

Tick Tock Day

December 29, 2015 ruthlane Comments 16 comments

December 29th is called Tick Tock Day. It is a reminder that there are only 2 days before the new year. It is traditionally when the prior year is reviewed for lessons learned and achievements met, lists are made for the coming year whether it be new year resolutions or goals and dreams that you long to fulfill. So it seems a good day for me to look back over what we have accomplished here at The Felting and Fiber Studio and what I have managed creatively in 2015.

At the Studio, we started off the year with a focus on color. All of the Studio Challenges related to color this year. Thanks to everyone who participated in the color challenges and we hope you learned a little more about color wheels, color schemes and how to blend different colors of wool to achieve the exact color you wanted or needed.

We were very proud to begin offering online classes here at the studio. We had several very successful Wet Felting for Beginners classes and I offered the first module of a series of classes Nuno Felting with Paper Fabric Lamination. In 2016, the Wet Felting for Beginners is available at your convenience and I will be starting my first Experimental Screen Printing on Felt class on January 22nd. I plan on offering the Nuno Felting with Paper Fabric Lamination in the spring too.

Our number one viewed post for 2015, was the wonderful tutorial on making slippers by Nada V. The other posts in the top 5 were Eco Printing Onto a Silk Chiffon Scarf by Terriea Kwong, Ice Dyeing – A Quick How To, Making a Cat Cave and our page Wool and Other Animal Fibers. So you can see that posts from our forum members and guest artists are very popular. Thanks to everyone who contributed to the site this year – we appreciate it.

Now on to a few things that I created myself this year. It seems like all I did was work on my online class videos and PDF’s. I know I spent a lot of my time with that for sure. But I did make a few things.

Layered, burned synthetic fabric, Ruth Lane

There was dyeing fabric, dyeing fiber and playing with Gotland locks. I made some slippers, cat toys, notebook covers, phone sleeves and drink sleeves. I played in my sketchbooks all year long and made one sketchbook that was a study in shades of green. With my local surface design group, we played with screen printed rust, layering synthetic fabrics, mixed media paintings, silk paper making, making silk screens and soy wax combined with shibori techniques. I started a new project with my friend Deb Stika using her designs for machine stitched samples which might become a book someday.

My friends and I self published a book called The Whitefish Fashion Collection and put on an exhibition of all the sketches and artwork included in the book in August.

This is one of the sketches that I recreated in stitch and colored pencil on fabric.

I also traveled a bit in 2015 including visiting Puerto Vallarta, Mexico and New York City. Both were inspirational in different ways.

I enjoyed assisting Gail Harker in a Level 1 Experimental Hand Stitch in Kalispell in June. It was a great group of ladies and we all had a wonderful session of stitching. We are planning a Level 1 Experimental Machine Stitch course in May of 2016 with more details to follow.

The year has been a busy one and I think next year will be the same. I always seem to have something on my plate. What do you have planned for next year? We would love to hear about it on the forum or if you have an idea for a guest post, please let us know. We are still looking for anyone who is interested in teaching an online course. We would love for you to submit a proposal for a class.

So Tick Tock, the year is coming to a close. We here at The Felting and Fiber Studio wish you a happy and creative, fiber filled new year.

Pandagirl’s Year in Review 2015

December 27, 2015 Marilyn aka Pandagirl Comments 26 comments

I really challenged myself the beginning of 2015. I was determined to try free motion embroidery and used Rosiepinks (Lyn’s) instructions for making a round bowl. It turned out nice, but it was a little tense going round and round.

My fan has to be the hardest felt project I’ve done so far. Getting and keeping all those fan blades in place was maddening.

Then I began work on making batts and bootie favors for my daughter in law Mari’s baby shower. 60 of them!

I attempted a felted box.

A clutch/makeup bag for a new Grandma.

I gave my drum carder a workout blending colors and making a color wheel for the 1st Quarter Color Challenge.

Still in baby mode, I felted over a wire baby buggy.

Cathy and I received our first order from WOW, so the sample making began using wools I hadn’t used before.

A wine bottle cozy.

Going back to my roots, I made denim paper, then felted it, and later made a glass case.

Stepping out of my comfort zone, I started using neutral colors and some wildly bold combos.

Some wooly fun with my Grandson Luke.

For a short period, Cathy and had a fish off.

For the 3rd Quarter Challenge I used a color generator, dyed, carded some batts using those colors, then made in Ipad cover.

My sister invited me to her quilt group for a Trunk Show.

To keep my earrings organized while I travel I made a jewelry roll.

I tried getting my work space organized.

Cathy and I attended the Wisconsin Sheep and Wool Festival.

Dyeing for special projects. Some yet to be seen.

A nuno wall hanging for my daughter in law Lia.

A challenge in combining techniques to make an elephant pic for my Sister.

The 4th Quarter Challenge – monochrome panda with dimension.

Odds and ends.

Making ornaments with my Grandsons.

I had a lot of help this year and want to thank Cathy Wycliff for posting about making arm warmers, learning to make batts, her artist residency in Breckenridge CO, dyeing with natural plants, and Bengala dyes; Zara Tuulikki Rooke for showing us her process for making batts from raw fleece, shearing sheep, lambing in Sweden, making a rug from raw fleece and sampling different Swedish wool breeds; Leonor Calaca for giving us a virtual tour of the Knitting and Stitching Show in London; Carol Gascoigne (Craftywoman) for submitting her 3rd Quarter Challenge; Lyn (Rosiepink) for her 3rd Quarter Challenge submission; Mary Stori for her advice on beading; and Jill Chadek for sharing her journey to becoming a felt artist.

Happy New Year! On to new felting journeys for 2016!

December 25, 2015 zedster66 Comments 17 comments

I suppose my ‘Year end round up’ wouldn’t be complete without me saying I didn’t get half as much done as I’d have liked! Or that I’m surprised I got as much done as I did 🙂
One of the biggest things of this year for the 4 of us was starting our online College of Felt and Fiber Arts with the ‘Wet Felting for Beginners’ course. We got some brilliant feed back for that and so many requests and enquiries about classes that we decided to have it on-going continuously.

I tried out a lot of ‘new’ wools earlier this year which I’d discovered on the wollknoll site. This is one listed as ‘Arctic Fox’, I never did find out what it actually is, though it was quite soft and similar to Bluefaced Leicester. I tried a variety of fibres with it, along the top is Soy top, below that is black Bamboo top (L) and Milk Protein (R), then some Hemp fibre, and at the bottom is Viscose top:

This was ‘Russian Camelhair’, which I guessed was camel coloured Romanov. I used Ramie fibre with it:

In May, I finally finished an e-book I’d first had an idea for and started working on about 8 years ago. ‘The Right Fibre‘ is (like it says on the ‘cover’) a guide to using embellishment fibres in wet felting.

I tried over 20 different embellishment fibres (some didn’t make the final edit) and made lots of control samples and felting techniques to see the kind of things which affect the outcome of how the fibres look. It was hard, playing with wool and fibres, but someone had to do it 😉 Actually that was the fun part, it was having to keep leaving it alone to stew for a while until the ideas of how to organise the sections and how to format it fell into place. Luckily, as with other e-books and tutorials I’ve written, I had lots of help from studio site and forum members and my poor non felting girlfriend who now has an unusually large range of knowledge and understanding of all things wool, felt, fabric and fibre, despite never having felted in her life 🙂

In August I did ‘MakeFest’ at the Science and Industry museum, helped by my sister. It was hectic and overwhelming at first until we got some order and organisation. I learned that it’s possible to make a nice piece of felt on your first try at any age, and even the worst lumpy, clumpy layouts will turn out pretty good. We had lots of nice people having a go, this was the layout by Annabelle, who did it all by herself and was only 5:

I got interested in creativity for well-being or ‘Art Therapy’ this year and posted about the first wet felting workshop. This was everyone working away:

And just last week I told you about the Start2 website which has lots of activities designed to get you creating and improve your well-being. I had quite a lot of fibres left over from MakeFest, so I did a fair bit of dyeing last year. This is dyed viscose:

Some dyed Bamboo staple:

And Silk Carrier rods:

Another highlight of the year was getting lots of gorgeous Swedish wool and Gotland Locks from Zara:

I did manage to do some felting this year! This was my favourite piece, inspired by plaid:

I hope everyone has had a good year with lots of felt and fibres 🙂

Pandagirl’s Year in Review

January 25, 2015 Marilyn aka Pandagirl Comments 25 comments

I know I’m late to the party, but I’ve been traveling and have several family affairs looming that need my attention.

I started out in 2014 as a forum member and then in March I was a Global Moderator! This past year has brought many challenges and delightful learning and wonderful outcomes in terms of felting.

My year started with experiments in dyeing.

I shared my venture into encaustics.

Tried my hand at painting with wool.

Experimented with different wools.

Participated in the quarterly challenges.

Stewart Stephenson - Marilyn — Stewart Stephenson – Marilyn

Monet 2 after felting — Monet 3rd quarter

Tried framing methods.

I broke down to drum carder envy and began my foray into making batts. Woo hoo!

Cathy and I tried indigo dyeing.

My marketing blogs…

I know it’s been awhile, but its more fun felting than marketing… Sorry.

I taught a felting class.

There was a period of obsession with pods and vessels.

I ventured into free motion stitching.

Then I experimented with embellishments and making a book cover.

Designing and making a handbag was a huge accomplishment for me.

I experimented with 3D felting – grapes and flowers.

I learned a lot of new techniques in Fiona Duthie’s class.

It was a busy year visiting farms, mills and fairs.

I made scarves including a cobweb scarf.

A big project was a 3D free motion stitched bowl, oh my!

Felting a rooster, I learned to combine wet and needle felting.

Our holiday exchange was an experiment of combining beading and felting.

All in all, it’s been a very productive and inspiring year felting. Of course, there were many more projects that were completed. It has been a wonderful year. I want to thank all of you for teaching, inspiring me and encouraging me to do and try more. Thank you! A special thanks to my fellow moderators and Luvswool (Cathy), Leonor at Felt Buddies and Nada for pitching in and contributing to the blog. It’s been a terrific, fun journey. I can’t wait to see what 2015 brings and what I learn and try!

A New Felting Year

January 5, 2015 Shepherdessann Comments 15 comments

We are starting a new blank calendar. It’s time to look back and look ahead. As I look back at my year it’s been quite busy. There have been lots of classes and I even took a couple of classes.

I managed to do some art with felt and make a huge curly fleece hat with horns for an exhibition.

There were not so good things. I didn’t get recalled to work in September so I am unemployed. On the bright side at least it was a good time. I had shows coming up so I did make some money. I sold some work to a store and got invited to sell work in a local museum store. One of the best things to happen has nothing to do with felt or wool. I found out I will be a grandmother in February. So now I have a reason for all this gray hair, I will be a nana.

My new year will be exiting with the new baby, hopefully a new part time job and more felt. I am hoping to try for the 3rd time making the felt boots I was supposed to try again last year. I think it will be a good year. I hope your year was good and the new one will even better.

Year End Round Up

December 30, 2014 zedster66 Comments 26 comments

Every year I think I never had much time to do everything I wanted, but at least I did get to do some things which I enjoyed. I always enjoy the challenges we do on the Studio site and seeing everyone’s entries. I think this was my favourite piece from all the challenges, from Ann’s Stewart Stephenson challenge:

I tried a few new things this year, one of them was making a hat for the first time:

I also tried commercial prefelt pieces kindly donated by Heidi Feathers.

I also tried a new embellishment fibre, Kapok:

And some new animal fibres. This is yak, it was the softest fibre I’d ever felt (or felted!):

Until I got some camel fibre, even softer!:

I know a lot of people prefer to make felt with a ‘purpose’, but I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of experimenting and trying combinations of different wool breeds or animal fibres with various embellishment fibres, just for the fun of it. A few of my favourite pieces: Dark Brown Corriedale with Ingeo:

Angora goat with black and white viscose:

Another things I love is texture, surface design and sculptural felt, I did a bit of that this year too:

I do like colour too, so had fun dyeing a lot of wools and embellishment fibres recently. The milk protein was especially gorgeous:

Thanks a lot for all the support this past year and all the nice comments an helpful advice, I hope you’ve enjoyed your past year too 🙂

Felting and Fiber Studio

An International Collective of Felt and Fiber Artists

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Category: Year End Round Up

Happy Holidays from All of Us at The Felting and Fiber Studio

December 24, 2017 ruthlane Comments 19 comments

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Pandagirl’s Year in Review 2016

December 29, 2016 Marilyn aka Pandagirl Comments 17 comments

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2016 Year End Round Up

December 27, 2016 zedster66 Comments 10 comments

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Year End Round Up 2016

December 23, 2016 ruthlane Comments 11 comments

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Tick Tock Day

December 29, 2015 ruthlane Comments 16 comments

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Pandagirl’s Year in Review 2015

December 27, 2015 Marilyn aka Pandagirl Comments 26 comments

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Year End Round Up

December 25, 2015 zedster66 Comments 17 comments

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Pandagirl’s Year in Review

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A New Felting Year

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Year End Round Up

December 30, 2014 zedster66 Comments 26 comments

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